Game day: UH vs. Georgia State

UH returns home to the friendly confines of Robertson Stadium for its final non-conference battle of the 2011 season, a home game against Georgia State. The Panthers, a Football Championship Series squad, are 1-2 this season while UH is looking to go 4-0 for the first time since 2006. Kickoff is at 7 p.m. Here are your need-to-knows for tonight, followed by some notes:

CoverageTV: CSS (Comcast Sports Southwest)
If you don’t have Comcast or a carrier that carries the network, then it’s anybody’s guess as to how to get the ballgame. If you stumble across any other ways to access a live broadcast or video feed, feel free to post any links in the comment section and I’ll post them on the live chat tonight.

Radio: 790 AM

Also, I will be hosting a live blog/chat session above. It will go on through the duration of the game.

WeatherAs of Saturday morning, the forecast is calling for clear skies, temperatures in the mid-80s and humidity around 31 percent. Zero percent chance of precipitation (Source: Wunderground)

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Today, the Houston Cougars return home. And they are quite happy to do so.

Two weeks of tough road games has put the Cougars to the test, perhaps much more so than they or their fans expected, but nonetheless, the Cougars have come out of it unscathed, bringing a 3-0 record into tonight’s game against Georgia State at 7 p.m. at Robertson Stadium.

And while some may have come away puzzled or surprised that the Cougars had to come from 27 points behind to beat Louisiana Tech 35-34 and remain unbeaten, in a way, it has grown some more confidence around the team.

“We believe we can win every game from the start, no matter what situation we get in,” senior quarterback Case Keenum said. “That sort of proved us right. We can come through in any situation that we need to. That’s big for confidence for a lot of guys to see that that haven’t been around. I think the seniors and the leaders on the team came through. Even younger guys…I thought everybody played well when we needed them to.”

As the clock wound down in that game, Keenum told his teammates that he was proud of them and that he loved them, but he also made sure to get the message across to his teammates that they have to start faster. After two weeks of slow starts, today is an opportunity to do that.

“I kind of talked about that when we needed to turn it on (Saturday), we did,” Keenum said. “Let’s learn to turn it on when we want to, not when we have to. Let’s flip the switch right at the start, not necessarily wait around like we did.”

“I didn’t think any different than I thought at halftime. In any situation like that, as I’ve told our team many times, it doesn’t matter what anybody thinks, it matters what you think. You can’t win games like that if the guys don’t believe they can win. Although there are a lot of people that think differently about us, obviously our team thinks we can win every game. I’m glad they don’t think like a lot of people do.”

Because Georgia State is a young program, that’s just in its second season and competes in the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), it’s unlikely that they’ll have the talent to match the Cougars. But the coaching staff is tenured with a lot of experience and success on its resume.

“It’s going to be real interesting for me because to me, coach (Bill) Curry is a coaching legend,” UH coach Kevin Sumlin said. “Here’s a guy who was the ACC Coach of the Year, the SEC Coach of the Year, the National Coach of the Year and has coached over 200 ball games. He has a veteran staff with George Pugh and John Thompson, which are guys that have been around forever, and it’s a brand new program. It’s the program’s second year, so there’s a lot of excitement, and those guys are going to be excited to come in here and play. Obviously with their pedigree and their coaching staff with (offensive coordinator) John Bond, they’ve been around and done a lot of things. They’ve got a new quarterback (Bo Schlechter), who’s been effective for them, and a very good punt returner and wideout (Albert Wilson) who is pretty spectacular when he gets the ball in his hands and does some good things. They are going to come in here and be ready to play. For us, every week we look at it as a challenge but we’re also looking at it as a chance for us to get better, which we need to do, and chance for us to take one more step.”

Outside hitter Katie Norris turned in another strong performance, posting a career-high 18 kills (exceeding her previous career high of 17 set on Tuesday in a win over Rice). Stephanie Nwachukwu also added a career-high 16 kills in the win. Freshman Caitlin Ogletree had a season and career-high 53 assists.

UH returns to the court on Sunday at 1 p.m. when it hosts Tulane at the Athletics/Alumni Center.

Soccer drops conference opener

The Cougars saw their three-match win streak snapped on Friday in their Conference USA opener, falling to Memphis 2-1.

The Tigers, who are ranked No. 9 in the nation, jumped to a 2-0 first half lead. UH responded with a second half goal from Jessica Zavalza, but would not come any closer.